Dell Inspiron 1720 Upgrade

Just registered so this is my first thread/post.

I have a Dell Inspiron 1720, which is well out of warranty and I am looking to do some DIY upgrades.

My current spec is:

Windows 7 - 32-bit

Intel Core 2 Duo T5750 @ 2.00GHz
3 GB RAM
Samsung HM320JI ATA Drive - 320GB @ 5400rpm
NVIDIA 8400M GS GPU

I am looking to upgrade:

CPU - Intel T9300
HD - Seagate Momentus XT 500GB Hybrid @ 7200rpm
GPU - NVIDIA 8600M GT

I have been trawling through the internet and this seems to be the best I am going to get out of the Inspiron 1720.

Has anyone else performed these or similar upgrades on the Inspiron 1720? Do you have any advice on how to carry out the work etc?

Cheers,

Warren

 

The CPU and HDD are good to go. However the video card for the Vostro 1720 is soldered onto the motherboard, so that is a no go. The older Vostro 1700 had a discreet video card just like my Vostro 1500.

 

Hime, he has an Inspiron 1720, not a Vostro 1720.

... so all of the upgrades should work, assuming you get the proper 8600M GT.

 

Thanks for the quick reply. You have highlighted an issue with the GPU that I have seen elsewhere. There seems to be a lot of confusion over upgrading the GPU. Some people say it can't be done and others say they have upgraded from the 8400M GS to the 8600M GT. I think I will wait to have a look at the GPU when I am changing the CPU to see if it can be removed or not.

 

Sorry. Only just seen your reply. So you think the 8600M GT will work then? Will is make much of a difference to the 8400M GS? I understand that it will run HD movies better. Will there be a noticable difference running games?

Cheers.

 

Just make sure you get the right one. It won't make any difference in video playback. It should be better gamer, but I don't know if there'll be a significant difference.

 

Why are you looking to do the upgrades? Are there any applpications that are not running well currently?

 

Sorry T_____T I'm going blind.

Then yes the Inspiron 1720 is the consumer equivalent of the Vostro 1700 where the GPU is removable. Make sure you if you order the GPU alone that you use your current heatsink or you order a new one as the 1720/1700 have different heatsinks than the 1500/1520 as different sized notebook.

If you want better gaming performance, upgrade up!

 

I'm not sure about the value of these upgrades.

Sure, the cpu will give up to 25% better synthetic performance (real world will depend on the application) but at what cost (I'm seeing this as a $350 'upgrade'?).

The video card 'upgrade' seems to me like a possibly bad trade off:

See:
GeForce 8600M - Notebook and Laptop


I agree 100% with the hybrid HDD, but my 'upgrade' path would be as follows:

Upgrade O/S to 64bit Win7;

Upgrade the RAM to 4GB minimum - 6GB may be beneficial for your use and even 8GB if you're a heavy multi-tasker and the system supports 8GB of RAM.

All on a new 500GB XT (partitioned).

While you can throw more money at this project, your net performance increase will be drastically less with each additional upgrade you do to the above.

I would rather suggest selling your old system and buying even an i3 or i5 based platform with the same net cost for much more performance gained.

Even better would be to 'upgrade' to a Sandy Bridge based platform early next year (or pick up current i3/i5 based systems even cheaper than they are going for now).

Good luck.